Immigration Phobia and the Security Dilemma

This book shows that 'immigration phobia', or excessive anti-migrant hostility, is widespread globally.

In this post 9/11 world, people are concerned about the security implications of international migration. Do they understand their fears? Would it help to enact fear-based policies on immigration? This book explores and compares the immigration attitudes in the Russian Far East, European Union, and the United States.Immigration phobia is a paradoxical global phenomenon: neither theories that link conflict to symbolic and realistic threats, nor the 'contact hypothesis' can systematically explain intense anti-migrant alarmism and exclusionism toward marginally small migrant minorities. Through a careful comparative study of immigration attitudes in the Russian Far East, the EU, and the United States, this book is the first to demonstrate that concerns about national identity and economic interests associated with migration are themselves ignited by a unique perceptual logic of the security dilemma. Regression analysis and case studies trace support for expulsion of migrants to human yearning for pre-emptive self-defense under uncertainty. Alarmism and hostility arise from ambiguities about immigration consequences and migrants' motivations. Framing migration as a national security problem is therefore logical, but counterproductive. The book instead recommends managing migration through economic incentives and new institutions at the global, national, and local level.